


Jim.

by tprillahfiction



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Fluff, K/S Advent 2013, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-26
Updated: 2013-12-26
Packaged: 2018-01-06 04:43:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1102551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tprillahfiction/pseuds/tprillahfiction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A mash up of Star Trek Into Darkness and A Christmas Carol.<br/>Warning: mention of Character death<br/>Mostly fluff some minor angst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jim.

Victorian England, 1840.

Once upon a time there was a bitter man by the name of James Tiberius Kirk.  He owned Kirk and Pike Realty Company as it was formerly known.  Now it was only Kirk Realty Company and all was as it should be.  The clock struck three of the clock as he counted in the days takings and noted there was still quite a few rents to collect from--some thought they would get away with not paying rent, eh?  As he placed the gold into the safe, shutting the door making sure it was locked up tight, he glanced up to see his underling, the clerk called Leonard McCoy-- a man James referred to as Bones, due to his emaciated look about him, Bones probably thought it was a simple nickname, when it was definitely an insult--sneaking a wistful look at the gold.  

“Something you want, Bones?” he seethed at his clerk.

“Nothing, Captain.”  While James T. Kirk was once the captain of a vessel as a young man, it was many years ago but everyone who came in contact with him called him: “Captain”, lest they invoke his wrath.  McCoy rubbed his hands in front of a candle burning on his writing desk.  Kirk noted this, the man setting down his fountain pen--stopping work would be docked a half hour’s pay.  “But--”

“But, but, but,” he growled at the man.  “Always a ‘but’.  Spit it out, McCoy.  What is it?”  

McCoy appeared absolutely terrified, but seemed to work up some type of nerve.  “It’s very cold.  My hands are freezing.  I’ve got chilblains.  Making it difficult to write.”

“And your affliction is my problem...how?”

“My hands.  Could we...” McCoy’s teeth appeared to be chattering, the bloody faker.  “Could we light a fire in the fireplace?”

Kirk grinned--not a friendly grin and probably more like a grimace.  “Light a fire in the fireplace, you say?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why don’t you go ahead and do so, McCoy,” Kirk hissed.

“Oh! Thank you sir, I will sir!”

“But,” Kirk said.  “And there always is a ‘but’, if you arise from that chair before your shift is over--I have no choice but to dock you another half an hour of pay.”

McCoy seemed crushed.  “Oh.” He glanced at the clock.  “Well, sir.  It’s only a few more hours, sir.  I need the pay.  I’ll stick it out.”

“Hmmm.”

McCoy picked up his pen and went back to work, scribbling furiously, the scratching of pen against paper loud in the quiet but for the tick tock of the clock.  

Kirk finally muttered:  “You wouldn’t need the money, were it not for all those children you spawned--how many are there?”

“Five sir.  Just had a baby.” McCoy beamed at that, the idiot.

“Five.  Five plus you and the wife.  Seven mouths I must feed--I didn’t ask for all those children to support--that was you and your doing.  Keep your genitalia in your pants, I say.  Why must I be forced to support them?  So you can ask me to light the fireplace and waste even more of my hard earned funds.  You are humorous McCoy.”

“I beg forgiveness, Captain,” McCoy said.

“Hmmm,” Kirk replied.  

After more quiet and the scratching and the tic tock of the clock, Kirk added:  “You wouldn’t even be in this situation--in my employ were I not have felt sorry for you.  Losing your medical license, _Doctor_." (he'd said that title with profound sarchasm and Bones lowered his head at that)  "No one else would take you on as an employee, _Doctor_.  Only I did.”

“Yes, Captain.  I am grateful to be your lowly clerk, sir.”

“As you should be, Bones, as you should be.”

There was a loud knock at the front door.  Kirk made no move to answer it.  

“Should I get the door, sir?” McCoy wondered.

“Answer the door,” Kirk grumbled.  “Probably some more rents, it’s about time, as well.”

McCoy opened up the door.  “Merry Christmas!”  

Ah, it was one of the tenants, Montgomery Scott.  The man came in, dressed up in insufferable greens and reds, argh, the combination of those colors was truly revolting. Holly was stuck to the man’s hat the idiot, didn’t Scott see how ridiculous he looked? Good thing Kirk had banned employees from wearing those nasty colors during shift.  “You’d better have that rent, Scott!” he bellowed out.  “Or you shall suffer eviction on the morrow.”

“Please sir, tomorrow’s Christmas.  Have some heart.”

“Where’s my money, Scott?”

“It’s here, Captain Kirk.” Scott pulled out a small velvet bag.  “It’s here.”

Kirk took the bag from him, poured out the money onto the table, immediately counting it.  “You’re short.  Where’s the rest of it?”

“I am, sir.  I need some money for Christmas.  Food and gifts for the family.”

“Bah humbug,” Kirk replied.  

“I’ll have the rest of the rent in two weeks.”

“I want the rest of that money, now, Scott.”

“But what about Christmas, sir?  My family?  I need to buy food and toys for the kids this evening, so they have gifts to open under the tree on christmas morning.”

“I do not care.”  Kirk held his hand out.  “The rest of the rent, or face eviction on the morrow.”  After a moment, Scott scowled, reached into his pocket and paid the balance due.  “McCoy write this man a receipt.”

As McCoy did so, Scott said:  “Perhaps you might fix the leak in my living room.  It’s been dripping steadily from the ceiling for a month.”

“Perhaps,” Kirk said, but knew fully well he would not.  Repairs were simply much too expensive.  

McCoy handed Scott the receipt.  “Be gone from my presence, Scott,” Kirk muttered.  

“Yes, Captain.  Merry Christmas.”

“Get out of here, and take your insufferable Merry Christmas with you!”

“Merry Christmas,” McCoy said to Scott before the man before he left out the front door.

Finally after all that lollygagging, McCoy came back over to his desk to resume his work.  Kirk glared at him but said nothing for the next half hour.  

Suddenly, at the window there erupted some ghastly noise:

_“Hark the herald angels sing_

_glory to the newborn king_

_peace on earth and glory all_

_god has sinners reconcile!”_

Kirk rushed to the door, flinging it open.  

" _We wish a Merry Christmas,_

 _We Wish you a Merry Christmas_ ,

 _We wish you a Merry Christmas_ ,

 _And a Happy New Year!"_  

“Happy Christmas, Gov!”

Kirk let out a strangled noise of aggravation.  The kids started on a new verse of the blasted song.  Kirk walked over to the desk and picked up several rocks collected specially for the occasion.  He began throwing them at the kids.  They screamed and ran off.  

Ah, finally.  Blissful quiet.

He slammed the door, went back to his desk.  He felt McCoy’s eyes boring into him but there was no comment.

The clock struck five o‘ clock.  _Ding, ding ding ding ding_.  McCoy put his pen down, closed the inkwell, donned his hat and scarf.  His coat and mittens already been on all day.  

“Where do you think you’re going, Bones?”  Kirk demanded.

“It’s five o clock, sir.”

“Five o’ clock.  Why so it is.  Fine.”  He waved the man off.  “Be gone with ye.”

McCoy didn’t move, seemed to be waiting for something.  

“Yes?” Kirk looked up.

“Uh.  My pay sir.”

“What about your pay, you daft git?”

“I was wondering if I could have it early.  Being Christmas Eve and all.”

“What sort of highway robbery is this?  Two days early?  Indeed?”

“Well, sir.  I need to buy Christmas dinner and presents for my family.  Please sir.  Please I beg of you sir, please let me have my pay early.”  McCoy removed his hat and put it at his breast.  “Please sir--”

“Oh, alright!  Stop with your pathetic pleading.  My God, McCoy, you are a nasty one, robbing me in this way.  Picking a man’s pocket because tomorrow is the twenty fifth of december.”

“It's Christmas,” McCoy insisted, as if that meant something.

“Humbug.  I say humbug.”  After a moment, Kirk finally opened up the safe, grabbing the aggravating clerk’s pay.  He thrust it into McCoy’s outstretched hand.  “Very well.  Here is your fifteen shillings.  Leave me be.”

McCoy still stood waiting.  

“What else do you want, McCoy?” Kirk asked.

“May I have...the day off tomorrow?  To spend with my family.”

“Out of the question,” Kirk snapped.  

“Maybe christmas morning?  A few hours sir?”

Kirk scowled.  “Fine.  You may have a few hours off.  Come in at noon sharp.”

McCoy broke out in a ridiculous smile.  “Yes sir, thank you sir!”

“Your pay will be docked for those hours,” Kirk growled.  

“Yes sir.”

“Get out of here, you fool.  You make me want to be sick.”

McCoy fled out of the office.

*

Kirk trudged through the bitter cold, his boots sinking in the snow with every step.  All around him there was “Merry Christmas” this and “Happy Holidays” that.  If he had his way, a hole would open up in the Earth and swallow up all these Merry Christmas revelers and their nonsense. 

What's worse is that their intolerable noise this evening and all their silly partying will probably keep him up all night.

Finally he reached his home.  

He stuck his key into the lock of his front door.  There was a wind, and in that wind he’d thought he’d heard his Christian name spoken aloud but that was simply his ears playing tricks on him.

He turned the key.  Somehow it got stuck and would not open the door.  

Another gust of wind.  “ _Jim...._ ”

Odd.  His name, again.  

And the knocker, placed on the very center of the door--he could have sworn it had assumed the shape of Christopher Pike, his former partner and also once his captain in the royal navy.  “ _Jim_....” the knocker appeared to say.

“Humbug,” Kirk hissed.  

The image of Christopher Pike faded.  Only then could he open that door.  

*

The only thing to eat in the cupboard was an old potato and a bit of wine.  He lit a small fire in the fireplace, starting the fire with all the christmas cards that had been mailed to him, they’d been resting on the floor by the door--those fools hadn’t put their rents in the envelopes--just simply silly good wishes that he didn’t need.  In the fire, he roasted the potato, sprinkled some mouldy cheese over it and it was good enough for a meal.  He could have done with more food as that potato had made him hungrier, but food was expensive these days and he wasn’t about to shop with all the annoying hordes.

This time he thought he could hear chains rattling.  Odd.  And his name once again: “ _Jim._...”

“Humbug,” he called out.  “Humbug I say.”

He readied himself for bed, dressing in his nightgown and hat.  He sat down on the edge of the bed, kicked off his slippers and blew out the candle.

The sound of rattling chains once again.  And:  “ _Jim_....”

He ignored it, got into bed and dove under under the covers.  

Then there was the sound of footsteps.  He sat up in his bed.  Was that a burglar?  Come to steal his money?  

He lept from the bed, went over to the fire, drew out a knife.  Let them try to come for his valuables.  At the last moment he decided to bolt up the bedroom door.

The footsteps grew louder.  He held tightly to the knife.  Raising it up.

They grew even louder, the sound of rattling chains proved deafening.

Unbelievably the bolts slid over, his door flew open.  The knife he clutched sprung from his and and embedded itself into the wall.  

He brought his hands to his face and tried to scream but could not.

A ghostly figure stood in the doorway, pointing at him.  “Jim!”

“What do you want?!” Kirk demanded.

“You!”

“Me?  Who are you?”

“You mean...who WAS I?  I was your business partner, Captain Christopher Pike.”

“Humbug, I told you.  Humbug!”

“Humbug or no humbug, I’m am who I say I was.”

“I don’t care.” Kirk’s hands were still on his face.  Now he covered his eyes.  “I don’t care!”

The ghost who claimed to be Christopher Pike stomped into the room.  Chains were wrapped around his grey and white body.  They made a ghastly grating sound as they slid along the floor.  “Jim!  Listen to me.”

Kirk covered his ears.  “No!”

“I implore you to listen!”

Kirk finally removed his hands and opened his eyes.  “What do you want?”

“I’ve been sent to accompany you.”

“Where?”

“Hell.  I am to take you down to the depths of hell.  This instant.  Do you remember how I died?”

“No,” Kirk insisted.  “I don’t remember.”

“Yes you do.  I was murdered by Khan on this very night, Christmas Eve.  Wasn’t I.”

“I don’t remember.”

“You do remember.  It was five years ago.  You remember it like it was yesterday.”

“And what if I do?” Kirk said, exploding back at the spectre.  “What does it matter?”

“Do you see these chains, Jim?” The spectre rattled them at him, most unbecomingly.  “I got these in hell.  Where I spend my time these days.”

“Good for you.”

“No,” Pike said.  “Not good.  I was a horrible man, no charity in my heart, bitter... and now my penance is to carry these heavy iron chains for eternity.”

“But you weren’t a horrible man!” Kirk insisted.

“But I was.  A greedy, horrible man.  As you are now.  And now--I am sent to bring you to hell.  But I feel for you James Tiberius Kirk, I really do.  I cared about you deeply when you served under me as first officer and when you became my apprentice adn finally my business partner.  So instead of taking you to hell--I’ve decided to go against my boss’s wishes--”

“Your boss?” Kirk scoffed, chuckling.

“My boss.  I’ve decided to incur more wrath and hellfire and damnation and more chains and use this opportunity to warn you, my son.”

“Warn me,” Kirk spat.  “I don’t need any warning.”

“You sound like a recalcitrant child,” Pike said.  

“I am nothing.  I want to be left alone.”

“You are correct, Kirk.  You are nothing.  You are but a shell of a man.  But you can change your ways.”

“I don’t need to change.  Go away and leave me be.”

“Jim Kirk, you will be visited by three spirits.  The first one will come at ten past midnight.  The second at ten past one, and the third at ten past two.  Be ready.”

“Be gone with thee!” Kirk yelled.  “Let me sleep!  And take your infernal ridiculousness with you!”

Amazingly, Pike moved towards the door.  “Remember.”  He disappeared.

*

Unable to sleep--that was more likely from the noise of the constant revelers and that blasted ear shattering noise they called ‘christmas carols’ in the street--he glanced at the clock.  Ten past midnight.

Ten past mid--!

“Hello, Jim.”

A translucent, elderly figure suddenly appeared.  Kirk recognized it.  “Spock?” he said.  It was that older version of Spock from the the 'other universe'--or so the eccentric beggar had once claimed--all balderdash of couse.  Kirk remembered when he used to give a half a crown to the man and listen to him talk about other planets and other alien beings and the Earth being round.  It was all simple idiocy-- but Kirk remembered the days when he used to humor the man with the oddly shaped ears and eyebrows and haircut and listen to his ridiculous stories about another Jim and McCoy another time another place another planet and schooners that traveled amongst the stars.  Then one day, this man had upped and died and Kirk had simply forgotten about him, didn’t attend the funeral, didn’t care.

“It’s good to see you again, Jim.”

“Yeah, likewise,” Jim said, not really meaning it.  “So you’ve come to warn me too?”

“I have.  Christopher Pike told you to change your ways, but oh no.  I’m not going do that.”

“What are you gonna do?”

“I’m here to show you.  I’m here to help you revisit your past.  I am what would be known in the Earth vernacular as ‘The Ghost of Christmas Past’.”

“Really,” Jim said skeptically.

“Indeed.  Are you ready, Jim?”

Spock the Elder touched him on the forehead and immediately they were somewhere else, not in Kirk’s home, but another home.  Kirk recognized it and the young cowering, crying boy.  

“Who is that boy,” Spock the Elder asked.

“It’s me,” Kirk told him softly.  “What is the meaning of this, why bring me back here?”

Spock the Elder said nothing but they both watched as a burly man walked up to the boy, who cowered even more, and said: ‘ _If you keep crying I’ll give you something to cry about.’_

“Who is that man?” Spock the Elder asked.

“My stepfather,” Kirk replied.  “Every Christmas was like this, a nightmare.  Beat me black and blue.”

Another image.  Young Jim Kirk riding away on his that stallion.  He was supposed to wash and tack it in the barn, but instead he took off with it, into the wilderness.  He reveled in the freedom.  He let that poor animal go free.  The stepfather was just as cruel to the horse as he was to Jim.  When he came home, without the horse, his stepfather beat him bloody.

“His horse?”

“No,” Kirk said.  “Mine.  It belonged to my father.  A war hero.  He died in battle as I was being born.”

Another image.  This time a young man, carousing with prostitutes, fighting in pubs, causing trouble.  Till one day he met Christopher Pike, who convinced him to join the royal navy.

Another image, James T. Kirk in the naval academy.  Resplendent in his cadet uniform.  

“There is where you met....” Spock the Elder broke off.

“Him,” Jim whispered.

“My counterpart.”

“Yes.”

They'd hated each other when they’d first met.  Spock had written an exam, the final to advance into the next year.  Jim did not like the particulars of said exam so rewrote it--staying up all night by candlelight to do so-- and turned that in instead.  Spock, bent out of shape about it all, brought a tribunal against Jim, tried to have him court-martialed.  But before that could happen, they were being attacked, all hands--even the cadets to their ships.  All except James Kirk, that is.  He was to stay ashore.  That was until--

“Dr. Leonard McCoy, your friend, smuggled you aboard the SS Enterprise, where he was assigned as Chief Medical Officer.”

“Yes.  Bones,” Kirk replied watching the image play out before him, idly wondering what the clerk was doing at this point in time, probably busy making more babies with that ghastly wife of his.

“Captain Pike was kidnapped by pirates, you and Spock rescued him.”

“Yes.”

"Spock lost his mother in their attacks."

"Yes."

“During that mission--you and Spock became...close,” Spock told him.

There was a beat before he said:  “Yes.”

“You fell in love.  But you waited until the mission was finished to declare your love for him.  He replied in kind, after of course he had ended his previous relationship.”

The scene--and he could hardly bear to watch this--their first kiss, making love for the first time.  How happy they were together.

“You proposed marriage.”

“Yes,” Kirk said.  “Finally thought it was time I settled down.”

“On Christmas.”

“Yes.”

“Things were happy for you both--for awhile.”

“Yes.”

“You received command of the SS Enterprise.”

“Yes.”

“And then what?” Spock the elder prodded.

Jim described the scene as they watched it.  “We lost our ship.  The only survivors were myself, Mr. Spock, Dr. Leonard McCoy and Mr. Scott.  Everyone else perished when it sunk off the coast of normandy.  Attacked by pirates.”

“You three managed to evade capture by pirates, you made it back to civilization.”

“Yes.”

“You three left the Royal Navy.”

“Yes.”

“You went into business.”

“Yes.  With my former Captain, Christopher Pike.  He’d been like a father to me.  The father I never had.”

“You were his apprentice?”

“Yes, in the realty company--then he offered me half of the business.”

“You worked long hours.  You ignored Spock, your lover.”

“I had to make a living, didn’t I?” Kirk spat.  “What else was I supposed to do?  Become a beggar like yourself?”

“You morned the loss of your ship and crew--you drank and fought with Spock, physically abusing him and hurtling insults.”

“Maybe I did,” Jim said.

“Spock left you.  Came to you that fateful day and returned the ring you had given him.”

Kirk waved off Spock the Elder.  “Yeah...uh...sure.”

“Did he, or did he not break up with you?”

Kirk cleared his throat.  “Yeah.  On Christmas.”

“You never saw him again, did you.”

“No.”

“You threw your energies into the business you shared with Pike.  Then he was murdered.”

“Yeah.  On Christmas.”

God, he missed them so much.  Pike...and Spock.

Suddenly he was back in his bedroom, it was as if he’d never left.  Spock the Elder was gone.  

“You see?” he seethed to nobody at all.  “It was just a dream!  Just--that old potato I ate! That moudly cheese causing me fits!  That wine, making me a hallucinate!  Humbug!”  A tear welled up in his eye came down his face, he could still feel Spock arms running down his body, could still feel Spock inside of him. 

Damn that pointy eared old man, that eccentric louse.  Didn’t matter it had all been nothing but a hallucination anyway.

Time for bed.

He sat down on it, pulled the covers over him.  And looked over at the clock.  Ten past one.

Ten past one?!

Another figure appeared, the spirit of a woman.  He recognized the woman too.  One of his old shipmates, who’d perished on board the Enterprise.  She was surrounded by gifts and splendor and sparkling things and lots and lots of food--turkey and potatoes and ham and cookies and cakes and pastries and green beans and custard and mmm he was hungry.

“Uhura!” he breathed.  

“Jim!” she replied.  “It’s good to see you again!  How have you been old man?”

“I’m--”

“It’s okay, I already know,” she said.

He couldn’t stop staring at her.  Wreath upon her head, lit with candles.  Slinky red dress.  “Why are you...” He gulped.  “Why are you dressed like this?”

“Jim, I am Mother Christmas!”

“Mother Christmas?  Never heard of the lady.  I thought there’s only a Father Christmas.”

“I can’t be ‘Father Christmas’ since I’m a girl--you nitwit!”

“Oh!”

Uhura began chewing on a turkey leg.  Jim began to salivate.  

“Want some?” she asked.

“Yes!” he said.

“Well, you can’t have it!  Do you know why?”

“Why?”

“You make your fellow man starve to death--your tenants and your clerk--all of them barely making ends meet, Scott and your other tenants without a Christmas dinner because of you--now you can watch me eat, old man!” she spat.  “How do you like that?”

“I don’t like it, very much at all,” Kirk agreed.

“I forgave you for stealing my man away, but I won’t forgive you for letting your fellow man and his family starve!  Not only am I ‘Mother Christmas’ I’m also the ghost of Christmas Present!  Here!”  Uhura held up a beautiful golden goblet.  “Drink this!”

“What is it?”

“Drink it!”

He did.  It was the most fantastic thing he’d ever tasted.  It made him feel all warm and snuggly and happy inside.  “What is it?”

“Khan’s blood.”

“What?!”

“Christmas Cheer.”

“It’s delicious!” he said.

“It would be.”

“Please can I have some more?” he asked.  “I’m very hungry.”

She swiped the goblet back from him.  He was no longer warm and snuggly and happy.  He was back to normal.  “I’m going to show you!” she said.  “Come!”

They began floating and Kirk had to say he didn’t like that very much atoll.  “What can’t you just touch my forehead to show me?” he asked.  “That’s what we did before.”

“I’m not a vulcan,” she shot back.  “In the present, we do this my way.”

They flew up in the air--Kirk shrieking at the height they achieved.

“Relax,” Uhura said.  “Stop being a baby.”

“We’re going to fall!”

“I should let you drop to the Earth--but no, I’m gonna show you.”

Finally.  Finally.  The slowly sank to the ground.  On main street in the poor section of town.  “Where are we going?” Kirk asked.

“Here.”  Uhura moved up to a window.  “Watch.”

“Watch?  Like a peeping tom?”

“Like a peeping tom.  You recognize this family?”

Kirk hesitated.  

“It's alright.  They can’t see us.”

“Oh.  Right.”

“Look.”

“I’m looking.”

It was the McCoy family, gathered around the table.  They were praying over what appeared to be Christmas Dinner, but a very sparse one for that large of a family.  A small goose had to suffice instead of a turkey.  Hardly any fixings at all.

“They’d managed to buy a Christmas Dinner on what little pay you give your old friend, Leonard McCoy.  Fifteen shillings, isn’t it?”

“It’s not my fault he’s a bum!  Murdered his father, and lost his medical license.  I say, his own damned fault.”

“Murdered his father, confound you--” Uhura smacked him upside the head.  

“Ouch!”

“His father was dying!  He eased the man’s suffering!  He would have sacrificed anything for his father and he did!  He had to go through the tribunal--the humiliation, all because he helped his father pass away comfortably--gave him that fatal dose of morphine.”

“He’s still a murderer,” Kirk insisted.

“You are a murderer, Captain Kirk.  You.”

“I gave him a job.”

“Fifteen shillings a month is not enough to feed a family.  You did nothing for him.  Didn’t have his back.  Gossiped and pointed at him like all the rest.”

They watched some more and Kirk noted for all their poverty, the McCoy’s were a very happy family.  They ate their small Christmas Dinner, laughed and sang, McCoy gave his family the little presents he’d managed to save up the money for. Then they had a toast, the family.  McCoy held up his cup of Christmas punch.  “... _and, God bless James Kirk_.”

Jocelyn McCoy lowered her glass.  ‘ _God bless James T. Kirk?  What in the devil do you want to bless him for, are you mad?_ ”

“ _It’s because of him I have this money to buy our feast._ ”

“ _Because of him?!  Leonard you earned this money!  You work your fingers to the bone.  He hardly pays you anything and you let him_.”

“ _I’m lucky to have a job_.”

“ _He’s lucky to have you!  A brilliant man_.”

McCoy raised his glass again.  “ _For all his faults, I love Jim Kirk and I say, God bless James T. Kirk._ ”

Jocelyn finally nodded.  “ _God Bless James T. Kirk_.”

Kirk turned to Uhura, “Did you hear that?  God Bless James T. Kirk!” But Uhura wasn’t there.  And it was freezing outside here in the snow, only clad in his nightgown.  

“Burrrr,” he said, shivering.  

You’d think she would have flew him back home.  He supposed he would have to make his way back home.  He started to walk in the snow, the cold freezing his toes.  

He felt an ominous presence behind him.  

He tuned around and gasped.

He knew it unmistakably to be the Angel of Death.  It was a skeleton, clad in a long black hooded cloak.  He couldn’t see the face.

This spectre did not speak.  Merely pointed the way.

“Where are we going, Spirit?” Kirk said.

It gave him no reply as they walked.

“Why won’t you speak?  What’s wrong with you?  Who are you?  Do I know you?”

The spirit continued to point.  

“I know who you are,” Kirk said.  “You’re the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come!”

A wind blew, knocking Kirk off his feet and into the snow, it was cold on his arse, snow melted a little and seeped right though his nightgown.  He quickly stood.  “I am right, am I not?”

The ghost pointed.  

“This way?”

The ghost nodded.

As they walked, they passed a gathering of people.  “ _Today is a great day!_ ” they gathered said.  “ _He’s dead_!”

“ _Is there to be a funeral_?”

“ _Are you kidding?  No one would show up_!”  The gathered laughed and walked on.  “ _The properties will be inherited by another landlord, much needed repairs performed, the rents lowered_.”

The ghost led Kirk into a pawn shop, three balls over the door.  A woman, he recognized her as one of his tenants-- stood, pawning several items which--

“Hey!” Kirk exclaimed.  “Those are mine!  She stole my belongings!  That’s my candlestick, my bedsheets, my clothes, my--”

 _"Curtains?"_  the shopkeeper told the woman, " _you don’t mean to tell me you took them down hooks and all with him lying there dead, did you?"_

" _Of course I did_ ," she said. " _He scourged us all this time, now it’s my turn to get him back!  if he’d wanted to keep ‘em in the family, he should have had somebody there looking after him, instead of lying there all dead, all alone_."

“All dead, all alone,” Kirk wondered.  “Who is this pathetic man?”

The spirit didn’t answer him, instead they walked back over to the McCoy house.  Looking into their window.  The baby wasn’t in it’s carriage or crib or it’s mother’s arms.  “Where’s the baby?” Jim asked.

" _Where’s father_?" one of the children asked.  

" _He’s at the cemetery_ ," Jocelyn replied gently.

Jim was still looking though the window.  “Where’s the baby?!” he began to panic.  “Where’s the baby?  Where’s the baby?  Oh God where’s the baby?”  

Suddenly one of the other older children brought the baby into the living room.  

Kirk practically gushed with relief.  “Oh!  It’s okay!  It’s alright!  The baby’s okay, it didn’t starve--” he stopped, tears began to roll down his cheeks.  He counted all the children, they were all there.

The spectre led him away, they walked down to the cemetery.  

“ _He’s dead!  He’s dead!  Thank God_!”

“Spirit," Kirk wondered. "Who is that pathetic dead man everyone speaks of?”

The spirit pointed the way.  He half walked half stumbled into the cemetery proper.  There was a grave, with a headstone.  Two figures were standing at it, clad in mourning clothes.  The only mourners in sight.

Flanked by the spectre, Kirk came up behind them.  They were McCoy and Spock.  His Spock--or the Spock that once was his.  

McCoy suddenly fell to his knees in the snow.  Sobbing.  Spock reached down and touched the man on the back of the head, obsensively to comfort the man.  Kirk felt a wave of jealousy seeing Spock touch another man in such a tender, intimate way.

" _Jim, Jim, Jim_!” McCoy cried out.  

Kirk peered closer to see the name on the gravestone.  “'JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK'.  Me?”

The spectre nodded.  

“They’re at my grave?”

The spectre nodded.

“I’m the lonely, pathetic dead man?”

The spectre nodded.

“I don’t know what McCoy’s crying about, he’ll inherit my fortune, won’t he?  I mean I did, finally, make a will.”

The spectre nodded.

“So he should be glad I’m dead.”

It was quite apparent that McCoy was beside himself in grief.  " _Jim, I’d give anything to have you back_."

“Bones, you silly man, I’m right here,” Kirk said from behind the pair.  “I don’t understand it, he’s now a very wealthy man.  Yet he is still very unhappy.  Doesn’t the money mean a thing to him?”

The spectre shook its head.

Kirk looked over at Spock, now he was shedding a tear.  

“You don’t have to cry, I’m here!"  Jim said.  "Spectre, all this unhappiness is breaking my heart.  I don’t want to die.  I beg of you!  I want to live!  I promise, I’ll change my ways--I’ll have charity and christmas in my heart.”  He sank to his knees, behind McCoy and Spock, he touched them both on the shoulders but they could not feel him, that in and of itself shattered him.  “Please, spectre, I don’t want to die, I want to live! I want to change my ways!”

The spirit disappeared.  

He began to sink, down down down into the ground.  He screamed.  “No!”  He was...

He was going down to hell!

He was traveling further and further down, down, down, down,

It was getting warmer and warmer and warmer then was HOT!

“No! Please no!” he begged.  He squeezed his eyes shut.  The falling was making him ill.

He opened them and found he was back in his bedroom.  He felt himself.  Skin, warm.  He was alive.

He was alive!

“I’m alive!” Kirk yelled. “I’m alive!”

He flew out of the front door.  He saw a kid trudging in the snow.  “What day is this?”

“Why Gov,” the kid said, “it’s Christmas!”

“YAY!” he screeched in happiness.  “It’s Christmas!”

The kid stared at him like he had gone insane.  

“MERRY CHRISTMAS!” he told the kid, and rushed inside to put on his clothes.

After he’d dressed in his coat, hat, scarf and gloves he rushed to the butcher.  He banged on the door.

“Hey!” the butcher called down from the apartment upstairs.  “We’re closed!  It’s christmas!”

“Open the shop!  I have goodies to buy!  Open it and I’ll give you a bonus!”

He bought the largest turkey he could, plus some toys for the children and delivered them all to the McCoy house.

McCoy’s eyes were wide when Kirk had come in, thought him quite mad. 

“MERRY CHRISTMAS!” Kirk shouted.

McCoy said, smiling:  “Merry Christmas to you too!”

“Doctor, I’m giving you a raise and I’m going to do what I can to help your family!  And on monday, when you come back after your three days off, you’re gonna help me lower the rents and then you’re gonna be my business partner. I’m changing the shingle to: Kirk and McCoy realty!”

“Thank you, Captain,” McCoy said, beaming.  “That means everything to me.”

“No...call me, Jim.  Like you used to, old friend,” Jim corrected him.

“Jim!” McCoy hugged him.  “You’re back!”

Jim opened his eyes.  He was no longer in Victorian England, he was in bed in current time.  A monitor beeped over head.  He gasped weakly.  

“Jim!”  McCoy, dressed in infirmary whites rushed over to his side.  

“Where am I?” he said, his voice scratchy.

“Starbase twelve infirmary.  You were dead, ya know.”  McCoy couldn’t quit grinning.

Jim glanced over at a figure, clad in grey, arms clasped behind his back, who looked as if he’d been there awhile.  Hadn’t moved from that spot.  He stared into those dark eyes.  The face impassive, but the eyes filled with emotion.  “You brought me back?”

“Uhura and I helped, Jim,” McCoy broke in.

“What day is it?” Jim asked.

“Christmas,” McCoy said.  

“I am,” Spock said, those lips now smirking, “quite happy that you are alive, Jim.”

“Happy?” Jim asked.  

“Happy,” Spock said.  

“Oh my God,” Bones said.  “This pointy eared nut--drove me insane--watching over you.  He had on the TV ‘A Christmas Carol’ repeatedly for two weeks straight.  I can quote those damned lines by heart by now.”

“I used to watch the film as a child--it used to calm me,” Spock explained.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Bones said.  “Just don’t get your ass out of bed, ya hear?”

“Promise,” Jim said, still looking into Spock’s eyes.

 _______________

 

END

 


End file.
